Learning to Love, and Learn from, Your Mistakes

Every so often I hear someone say, in the face of a clear mistake, “Hey, I’m only human, okay?”

What I’m tempted to say in response is this: “Umm…that was never really in question.”

What that person’s statement usually means is either they feel I’ve been projecting onto them an expectation of perfection, or they’ve been doing it to themselves. Usually it’s the latter.

Perfectionism is a disease that can plague any one of us. It’s particularly insidious, because it actually prevents us from doing our best work. In the name of having to be perfect, we lose the incredible lessons to be learned through our mistakes.